LSI Nytro PCIe SSDs win Oracle contract with new DLC functionality

LSI and Oracle announced today the inclusion of LSI Nytro flash acceleration cards into the next-generation Database Machine, the Oracle Exadata X4. The new DLC feature (Dynamic Logical Capacity) leverages the inherent caching abilities of the underlying LSI SandForce processors utilized on the Nytro PCIe SSDs.

SandForce controllers compress data, and DLC allows the drive to allocate the unused capacity back to the user. This means the drive can essentially store more data than it's physically available capacity.

We were lucky enough to catch Kent Smith of LSI SandForce giving a speech on just how this technology works during the LSI AIS 2013 event. For typical 2.5" SSDs it is referred to as DuraWrite Virtual Capacity, or DVC. We have confirmed with LSI that this is the same technology at use in the Nytro series of application accelerators.